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Is the US Phillips curve stable? Evidence from Bayesian vector autoregressions

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  • Sune Karlsson
  • Pär Österholm

Abstract

It has been claimed that the fall in US inflation during the Great Recession was surprisingly small. One possible explanation for this is that the Phillips curve is unstable and that its slope was lower around the Great Recession. We investigate the importance of time‐varying parameters using Bayesian vector autoregressions for inflation and unemployment. We find support for time variation in the inflation equation and an unstable Phillips curve that was somewhat flatter between 2005 and 2013. However, conditional forecasts mostly suggest that inflation was not unexpectedly high around the Great Recession, which puts the claim of a “missing disinflation” into question.

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  • Sune Karlsson & Pär Österholm, 2023. "Is the US Phillips curve stable? Evidence from Bayesian vector autoregressions," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 125(1), pages 287-314, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:scandj:v:125:y:2023:i:1:p:287-314
    DOI: 10.1111/sjoe.12508
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    Cited by:

    1. Derek Zweig, 2020. "Market Power, NAIRU, and the Phillips Curve," Abstract and Applied Analysis, Hindawi, vol. 2020, pages 1-18, December.
    2. Sune Karlsson & Pär Österholm, 2020. "A note on the stability of the Swedish Phillips curve," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 59(6), pages 2573-2612, December.
    3. Chan, Joshua C.C. & Eisenstat, Eric, 2018. "Comparing hybrid time-varying parameter VARs," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 171(C), pages 1-5.
    4. Aquino, Juan, 2019. "The Small Open Economy New-Keynesian Phillips Curve: Specification, Structural Breaks and Robustness," Working Papers 2019-019, Banco Central de Reserva del Perú.
    5. Beechey, Meredith & Österholm, Pär & Poon, Aubrey, 2023. "Estimating the US trend short-term interest rate," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 55(PA).
    6. Fu, Bowen, 2020. "Is the slope of the Phillips curve time-varying? Evidence from unobserved components models," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 320-340.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • C11 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods and Methodology: General - - - Bayesian Analysis: General
    • C32 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models; Multiple Variables - - - Time-Series Models; Dynamic Quantile Regressions; Dynamic Treatment Effect Models; Diffusion Processes; State Space Models
    • C52 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric Modeling - - - Model Evaluation, Validation, and Selection
    • E37 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Forecasting and Simulation: Models and Applications

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